Posted
by
Soulskillon Wednesday May 30, 2012 @05:45AM
from the just-a-few-more-decades-now dept.

New submitter jamstar7 writes "Following the success of the Falcon9/Dragon resupply test to the ISS comes the following announcement: 'Intelsat, the world's leading provider of satellite services, and Space Exploration Technologies (SpaceX), the world's fastest growing space launch company, announced the first commercial contract for the Falcon Heavy rocket. "SpaceX is very proud to have the confidence of Intelsat, a leader in the satellite communication services industry," said Elon Musk, SpaceX CEO and Chief Designer. "The Falcon Heavy has more than twice the power of the next largest rocket in the world. With this new vehicle, SpaceX launch systems now cover the entire spectrum of the launch needs for commercial, civil and national security customers."' As of yet, the Falcon Heavy hasn't flown, but all the parts have been tested. Essentially an upgunned Falcon 9 with additional boosters, the Heavy has lift capability second only to the Saturn 5. On top of the four Falcon Heavy launches planned for the U.S. Air Force this year, the Intelsat contract represents the true dawn of the commercial space age."

I am quite happy with the commercialization of space flight. I've always thought that the national space agencies were on the wrong path for decades. They always seem to aim for increased security and safety. I think spaceflight has gone over the top: the costs of increased safety are just not worth it. Commercial enterprises are excellent at making a proper risk assessment: certain risks are simply acceptable. This attitude is likely to reduce costs, which is what we need.

Obviously, NASA or ESA can still ask SpaceX to launch a couple of thousand tons of material into orbit, to assemble a Mars rocket and lander in orbit.:-)

When launching from Earth becomes easy, the next step can be considered.

Putting on my strategic management hat I was a little worried when I first heard this news. I should explain:In most engineering you have a core group of engineers. Put too many on one project and progress gets slower not faster. Likewise there are only so many good engineers around, adding poor engineers to a group slows the group down disproportionally.So the way to be successful is often to have the smallest team you can get away with working on one goal. Even having auxiliary teams that take the technology you develop and apply it to new applications slows the core team down because they need to provide support to the auxiliary teams. No amount of money or clever management or good people can really change this.So I was really worried about this particular step of the commercialisation of space because if they get distracted into competing with the entrenched players then they could lose the goal of getting cheap manned presence in space. If they are busy servicing commercial customers will this take their eye off the goal of manned space flight and orbital facilities?But then I guess that this commercial offering will keep them honest, accountable and above all visible to their costs so that others have to keep up. That and developing heavy lift is part of the end goal.That said I'm a little concerned that on Earth heavy lift is a relatively small part of the transport market. There are very few trucks on the road that carry more than 40 Ton, so why do we need so much spacecraft development focussed on >40Ton.I guess the answer to this is that most of the stuff on earth that is >40 Ton of the road is construction equipment and we certaily need a lot fo that in space...

So I was really worried about this particular step of the commercialisation of space because if they get distracted into competing with the entrenched players then they could lose the goal of getting cheap manned presence in space. If they are busy servicing commercial customers will this take their eye off the goal of manned space flight and orbital facilities?

That's not their goal. So you don't have worry about them losing it. And we should be expecting more from these "entrenched players". Some competition will help there. Finally, servicing commercial customers sounds to me a more worthy goal and not at all one incompatible with the others. After all, humans and habitats are payloads that a commercial customer might want launched.

There are very few trucks on the road that carry more than 40 Ton, so why do we need so much spacecraft development focussed on >40Ton.

OTOH, there are very few trains or cargo ships that don't carry at least hundreds of tons of payload. And supertankers can go to hundreds of thousands of tons of payload.

Because it's much less risky to get it all up there in one piece than to do space assembly. For now, at least. Even simple "assembly" tasks such as orbital rendezvous and docking require utmost care. Doing actual assembly as in humans or robots bolting things together is way harder.

I've always thought that the national space agencies were on the wrong path for decades. They always seem to aim for increased security and safety. I think spaceflight has gone over the top: the costs of increased safety are just not worth it. Commercial enterprises are excellent at making a proper risk assessment: certain risks are simply acceptable. This attitude is likely to reduce costs, which is what we need.

If you're going to send people into space then reducing risks is your primary objective. Astronauts spend years in training and are a very specialized group. If you play it lose with their lives you're not going to have many 'volunteers', and the time between missions will always be increasing.

Since the shuttle was the primary means for getting people into space and delivering goods to the space station safety had to be paramount. Doing it with unmanned rockets reduces all the costs associated to the del

If you play it lose with their lives you're not going to have many 'volunteers', and the time between missions will always be increasing

I'd have to go out on a limb here and say... no. Even if their was a 25% failure rate (which is obscene and not within the realm of feasibility) I guarantee that you'd have volunteers lined up to man the missions. Would they be as "highly qualified" as a NASA astronaut or Russian cosmonaut? No. But do they really need to be? The commercialization of space will do the same thing that it has done to every other sector and lower the skill requirements to accomplish tasks. Hell - if things go right they'll be lining colonists up at the gate in the next few decades - and I'll be in line even if I only had a 75% chance of surviving.

Even if their was a 25% failure rate (which is obscene and not within the realm of feasibility) I guarantee that you'd have volunteers lined up to man the missions.

Would you be willing to take a commercial air flight if the failure rate was 25%? 15%? 5%? How many pilots would fly with those failure rates? How many companies would send expensive cargoes with those failure rates?

Hell - if things go right they'll be lining colonists up at the gate in the next few decades - and I'll be in line even if I only had a 75% chance of surviving.

Yes, they'll have a lot of volunteers, but how many of those volunteers will have the necessary physical capabilities and specialized skills? Those that do will be too valuable to risk unnecessarily. Besides, where can we put a colony? There simply isn't anyplace that compelling.

es, they'll have a lot of volunteers, but how many of those volunteers will have the necessary physical capabilities and specialized skills?

Then let the market set the rate. If I can get a job at SpaceX Asteroid mining Co that has a 95% survival rate but pays about twice as much as a similar mining job on Earth, or one that has a 50% survival rate at Joe Bloggs Space mining co but pays 20x the ammount because of the money they saved on the rocket by cutting corners then let Joe Bloggs see if he can get anyone to work for him. If not he needs to increase his pay or improve his rocket.i agree when the Government is putting people in orbit they sh

Don't be silly, commercial airflight and space flight have nothing in common.

Would I board a jet knowing that there was a 25% chance of death? fuck no.

Would I board a manned mission that was worthwhile (ie. moon base, mars base) knowing there was a 25% change of death? fuck yes, you'd have to have the odds upwards of 75% before I'd even bat an eye. The potential benefit to humanity as a whole is well worth the sacrifice.

FYI I'm 6"4, in excellent physical shape with no medical conditions that would preclude

Would you be willing to take a commercial air flight if the failure rate was 25%? 15%? 5%? How many pilots would fly with those failure rates? How many companies would send expensive cargoes with those failure rates?

Would I pay to take a 1/20 risk of death for no benefit other than getting from one place to another? No. Would I take a 1/20 risk for a sufficient reward, sure.

Read about http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Klondike_Gold_Rush [wikipedia.org]
About 100,000 people went, 30,000 to 40,000 arrived, 15,000 to 20,000 became prospectors, and no more than 4,000 became rich. The article estimates that it cost about $1,000 to attempt to reach the Klondike, which for 100,000 people represents more money than was extracted in gold in the

The point I was making is that in order for commercial space flight to be successful, it has to be as safe as reasonably possible.
BTW, I spent a year in Iraq and had didn't leave my job after my COB was rocketed and mortared (other contractors did), so I think I've adequately proven my bravery.

The death rate of climbing Mt Everest is 1.3%. And that is just climbing a mountain. How much cooler is going into space? 10X?

Now at this point in my life where my family is depending on me 1.3% is too high. But when kids are older and I can be more selfish 5% doesn't sound that bad. Like everything else it's a personal decision.

if one or more spacex rockets explodes on its way to the space station, the launch escape system will kick in and save the crews life. wheres the space shuttles launch escape system? nowhere! you know why? its because the space shuttle sucks. and now its dead. and now spacex will achieve what the shuttle could for a fraction of the cost. and more safely. or better yet, it will achieve much more than the shuttle could ever do, for the same budget. and do things that should have been started 30 years ago.

First, launch escape systems only work if activated prior to an explosion. It won't save the lives of astronauts after the fact, the abort has to be done prior to the catastrophic event.

Second, of course the the Space Shuttle had Launch abort system. It had "Abort to Landing Site", "Transoceanic Abort Landing", "Abort Once Around", and "Abort to Orbit". Only Abort to Orbit was used in the program (STS-51-F):

those launch abort modes dont mean shit in a challenger type accident. a capsule that detaches and fires retrorockets to get away from a disintergrating rocket does. and launch escape systems work fine before or after a explosion. hell, the astronauts and their cabin survived the initial blast intact in the challenger disaster, and they only died when the cabin hit the water after it broke off. i wonder why they didnt unstrap, crack open the hatch, and parachute to safety in their full pressure suits, while

From what I've heard, there's no trade off between reliability and cost. The cheaper vehicles will probably be the more reliable ones as well, due to learning effects from increased launch frequency.

What I think was going on with NASA was overengineering parts for a ride with over a 1% loss rate. One can spend a lot of money making a nearly perfect part or process more nearly perfect. But if the overall system is unreliable and remains unchanged despite the improvement, then that expenditure is effectively wasted.

From what I've heard, there's no trade off between reliability and cost. The cheaper vehicles will probably be the more reliable ones as well, due to learning effects from increased launch frequency.

That's the theory. (Along with it's handmaiden, "simpler is safer than more complex".)To date however, there's no evidence that either is true. The Russian Soyuz family of launchers (and the R7 family they're derived from) are cheap, relatively simple, and the oldest and most flown design in the world

"Commercial enterprises are excellent at making a proper risk assessment" - like assessing the risk of a loan or mortgage defaulting, for example?

SpaceX is doing well, but lets please drop this ideological bullshit about markets being some magic diving mechanism. They aren't - they are a clumsy metaphor for the random noise generated by transactions. Not magic.

like assessing the risk of a loan or mortgage defaulting, for example?

- of-course.

The risk of defaulting on mortgages and other types of loans is absolutely negligible if there is a government guarantee behind the loan and also if the mortgage is given with free money printed by the Fed.

I don't see any mention of markets or magic in his post. And the other two parties to the loan and mortgage debacle, private citizens and the government, didn't do much better (what, they didn't know anything?). Given that the government and citizens got raped in the bailout while banks have made huge profits would seem to indicate they did a fantastic job of assessing their risks.

"Commercial enterprises are excellent at making a proper risk assessment" - like assessing the risk of a loan or mortgage defaulting, for example?

They got the bonuses and someone bailed them out. Sounds to me like they got the right outcome whether or not the risk assessment was "proper".

SpaceX is doing well, but lets please drop this ideological bullshit about markets being some magic diving mechanism. They aren't - they are a clumsy metaphor for the random noise generated by transactions. Not magic.

Clumsy ideological bullshit that works, mind you. If you want to regulate it, or replace it with a state enterprise, you should, as in the mortgage example you gave, be mindful of unintended consequences. What you consider "proper risk assessment" may not be what you are rewarding those parties for.

I am a true believer in free markets. But you are making a mistake assuming a particular commercial enterprise is going to be successful at making a risk assessment. The reason a free market is superior is because it uses the power of natural selection. Those individual companies that have been successful to their customers and owners to date will survive. Those that fail for whatever reason will die. The thing with risk assessment is there is no test you can do ahead of time to prove something will be succ

That is why you need to have a proper balance between commercial enterprise and government.

Governments are structured to make sure nothing goes wrong, any time something goes wrong in the government there is hell to pay.Commercial Enterprise are structured to take risks, when something goes right they are rewarded.

I disagree with the statement that "Commercial enterprises are excellent at making proper risk assessments". Commercial Enterprise left to its own devices will have the product safe enough so the

Since the Space Shuttle was first implemented, several successor systems were proposed that were considered significantly safer (notably the X-30 and x-33 VentureStar). But all were scrapped. One reason that was given, new technology just on the horizon would be even safer. The end result was that the U.S. government did not implement any of these inherently safer projects, but rather kept patching the inherently less safe shuttle program.

I think that you're entirely wrong in your assumption that SpaceX is somehow cutting corners safety-wise. They are not. Commercial bureaucracies, like those of the members of the Space Launch Alliance, are simply very inefficient at what they do. SpaceX does no more and no less than they'd do, safety wise, but is much better at it. They use engineers with same training, employ the same standardized part qualification and testing processes, etc.

The first time SpaceX kills a crew of astronauts, you'll be amazed at how NASA-style "security uber Alles" paralysis comes flooding back. There will be another lost decade of wailing and moaning and gnashing of teeth, just as if another Shuttle had been lost.

I agree about the safety point. Exploration isn't about safety. When Columbus set out to find a trade route to India he knew some motherfuckers would die on the way over. But he went anyway because he knew there would be some major dubloons in it for him if he made it. Of course it helped that he was backed by a gold-hungry monarchy and not a democracy that would rather vote for free cheese and tax breaks. But I digress.

If governments thought that there was money to be made in space (mining, harvesting, conquering and pillaging, etc) they'd be putting anyone they could into vehicles that were 'good enough' and sending them out to bring back the bounty. In Columbus' day (and for hundred of years after) people's lives weren't worth much. People were even were at risk of being attacked by waring armies or marauders or even their own king's men on a daily basis. Sadly this remains true in some parts of the world.

No, you don't digress at all. You describe a perfect example of the results of a risk assessment, and also why the results of modern governmental risk assessments are different. An investment is all about risks.

The trip Columbus took was ultimately to find a cheaper way to India. The fact that he found a new world was merely a coincidence, and actually meant a failure of the original mission. The investors that financed Columbus' trip were in it to make more money.

The trip Columbus took was ultimately to find a cheaper way to India. The fact that he found a new world was merely a coincidence, and actually meant a failure of the original mission.

Really? You're saying Columbus failed? Knowing what we know today about the shape of the world - which peoples of his time most certainly did not - can you really sit there and say he failed? He never had a chance! When someone is set up to fail, whether the participants know it or not, can you call it a failure? IMHO, I think not. Tragedy, maybe, but not failure - especially when so much more was learned about the world and set about events that altered the lives of damn near half the planet.

The investors that financed Columbus' trip were in it to make more money.

In the old days, government attitudes had swung perhaps to the other side: they completely ignored risks and were quite reckless at times. Good for exploration, bad for the health of people.

It might be interesting to add that a large portion of the explorations was (co-)funded by companies. The East India Company (both the Dutch and the English one) were companies, and were not owned by the crown or government.

Knowing what we know today about the shape of the world - which peoples of his time most certainly did not - can you really sit there and say he failed?

Ah, sorry, but this "People thought the world was flat, and Columbus proved that it was round" thing is a myth.

Peoples of the time knew very well the "shape of the world" as roughly spherical. They also knew roughly how large it was -- this had in fact been figured out around 200 BC by Eratosthenes. It was because of this, not a belief in a flat earth, that they thought Columbus was a fool. They knew that the distance to Asia was far too great for it to make sense to take the 'back route' to India. Colu

So, what you're trying to say, is that he really thought it was not round, and yet decided to sail WEST to get to India?
Look, it was well known that the planet was round long before Columbus was even born. It was thought to be smaller in diameter, which is why they thought the Americas were actually India at first.

Umm, no.

The approximate diameter of the Earth was known for about 2000 years before Columbus sailed.

It's more likely that Columbus simply lied in order to get the ships he needed.

Someone else said this, but it bears repeating: Columbus isn't important because he was the first person to discover the new world, he's important because he was the last. After his voyage, its existence became widely known public knowledge.
TL;DR: Columbus was the Apple of explorers.

Columbus had a globe which was about 2/3rd the size of reality, but claimed to be an expert on the topic. When he approached the Portuguese about traveling west to Asia, they laughed at him because they were fully aware of what the true size of the Earth was at the time. Then again, it is arguable that the Portuguese even knew about South America at the time but kept it secret for "national security" reasons. Columbus was contemporary with Henry the Navigator, and arguably the fastest route to Asia by se

SpaceX isn't about exploration, it's a commercial enterprise. NASA and the ESA are the explorers. As such, I'm sure SpaxeX is going to make their rockets as safe as possible, to aviod lawsuits if nothing else.

Columbus set out to find a trade route to India he knew some motherfuckers would die on the way over. But he went anyway because he knew there would be some major dubloons in it for him if he made it.

It's worth pointing out that there is no company called "SpaceX". The name of the company is "Space Exploration Technologies Corporation"

If you're going to say that a company whose name starts with "Space Exploration" and whose stated goal is to "make life multi-planetary" isn't about exploration, well, please define exploration; your definition seems to differ from mine.

The chance of losing your incredibly expensive payload is a factor in the price that customers are not going to ignore

That's why a major part of the cost of launching a satellite is insuring it. If the money you save by a cheaper rocket is less than the cost of the larger insurance premium you have won.And if rockets were cheaper you would be less risk averse when it came to satellite design and be willing to design a much cheaper satellite.So It's not a simple set of equations but put it this way: we don't design terrestrial domestic satellite dishes to be nine nines reliable because we can cheaply replace with a new one.

Individual companies suck as risk management. I'd have to agree on this one. Here is the problem for government vs. private enterprise though:

An organization, any organization (government, private enterprise, even a non-profit group) can have some brilliant leadership which does some amazing things, go to unique places, or achieve some remarkable accomplishments. Occasionally you will even find some organizations which can even produce a series of amazing results one after another.

Isn't that the best kind of maniac? Seriously, it takes someone of Herculean audacity to break into an entrenched market. SpaceX doesn't have hundreds of retired, formerly high-ranking military officers and former civilian employees of NASA to provide contacts, business intelligence, and influence. They may have lobbyists and "influence" over politicians, but definitely not to the same degree as the names you mentioned.

Erm, what do you think Boeing, Lockheed, Martin Marietta are? It's been commercial for decades. This is just another company among many, except this one is headed by a publicity hound megalomaniac.

Um, no.

Lockeed, Boeing, Martin Marietta et al are product based companies so totally dependent on DoD contracts they'd go belly up in a hot second i the funding all dried up. The only thing keeping them remotely profitable are the cost-overruns. At the end of the cycle, they deliver a launch vehicle, airplane,

The statement "The Falcon Heavy has more than twice the power of the next largest rocket in the world" is true but somewhat misleading. Both the USA [wikipedia.org] and Russia [wikipedia.org] have had rockets in the past with more than twice the power that the "Falcon Heavy" will.

The statement "The Falcon Heavy has more than twice the power of the next largest rocket in the world" is true but somewhat misleading. Both the USA and Russia have had rockets in the past with more than twice the power that the "Falcon Heavy" will.

A Saturn V sitting on the lawn of Johnson Space Center doesn't count, neither do Shuttle orbiters on display at various museums.

25k and 40k kg to LEO are a bit far short of the 53k kg of Falcon 9 heavy. Also I hope they get a bunch of launch contracts for Falcon 9 so they can fund the $1B they need for Merlin 2, it will be the first engine to produce more thrust than the F1 from the Saturn 5.

Space-X has a new engine in the design phase that will have 1.7 millon lbs of thrust. The Merlin-2 engine will be more powerfull than the Saturn-V's F1 engine was. The Falcon-X heavy will use 3 of these engines per core, or 1.5 times the lift of the Saturn-V. The Falcon-XX heavy would use 6 of these engines per core, for a total of 18 engines. It would have over THREE times the lift of the Saturn-V rocket! http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Falcon_%28rocket_family%29#Merlin_2_and_super-heavy_lift_concepts

The statement "The Falcon Heavy has more than twice the power of the next largest rocket in the world" is true but somewhat misleading. Both the USA and Russia have had rockets in the past with more than twice the power that the "Falcon Heavy" will.

Mentioned in the blurb:

Essentially an upgunned Falcon 9 with strapon boosters, the Heavy has lift capability second only to the Saturn 5.

One should note that you could put up 10 Falcon Heavy launches for less than the cost of 1 Saturn 5 in 2012 dollars, roughly c

This might sound strange, but guys like Intelsat avoid building satellites that can only be launched by one kind of rocket if in any way possible. Most geostationary satellites today cluster around 6 tons. This is the limit for the Russian Proton rocket (launched from Baikonur), the Ukranian/Russian/American SeaLaunch (using a Zenit rocket) and was the limit of the Ariane5 GS (which has been upgraded to the Ariane 5 ECA with about 10t. But ESA has a hard time finding customers for passenger satellites in the 2-3t range to make launches worthwhile.)

What does that have to do with SpaceX and the Falcon Heavy? Well, ESA is about to decide whether to develop a new smaller rocket - the Ariane 6 ( capable of lifting 3-8t to GTO) - or improve the Ariane 5 to the point that it can deliver about 12t to GTO. (With the idea of launching two of the popular 6t satellites at a time, which would instandly make the rocket much more economical)

In the latter case, SpaceX will have a much easier time to find heavy satellites for its rocket. Having a competitor is actually important in this business. You don't commit on the order of a billion dollars in building a satellite, just to find out that your only way to launch it is no longer available or recently had an accident (e.g. SeaLaunch or failures of the maiden flights of Ariane 5 GS and Ariane 5 ECA that also failed) and you have to wait several years to get another launch opportunity.

If ESA goes for the Ariane 6, SpaceX will most likely have to resort to launching several satellites at a time and compete with all the other guys that are also capable of launching "smaller" satellites. Which is bad for SpaceX and the industry in general. At the same time, ESA will find out that the old Ariane 5 will suddenly be in much larger demand for 8-10t satellites (as will be Falcon Heavy).

Lets hope they are reasonable... or somebody comes up with something roughly similar to the Falcon Heavy.

Well, just to point out, the delta IV-H already takes 13 tonnes to GEO. As such, FH, along with DIV-H, will likely double the size of sats to 10-12 T.
And Astrium is working on the 5ME,Though, SLOWLY is the word. I did notice that earlier this year, the ESA coughed up another 100M euros for it. However, Astrium/ESA suffers the same issues as old space: lots of money to accomplish anything. IOW, 100M Eu is more of a study than actual work being done.

Regardless, I think that the new norm will become 10-12T for sats. And with FH charging about 1/3 of Delta and 1/2 of China, Russia or ESA, I suspect that the prime launch system will become FH.

The list wasn't complete. And there really is no point even thinking about the Delta IV Heavy when it comes to commercial launches because of the cost. ($400mio or is it more already? It's at least twice as expensive as an Ariane 5. And that's not counting any of the money paid to the ULA just to keep the Delta IV available for military launches or its development cost.)

It all depends on the sat. For example our spy sats were loaded with heavy optics. And no doubt one that is double the size will have even better optics (or perhaps multiple cams). I can see bigger solar panels, more electronics.
And of course, fuel is useful.

Beyond that, being able to launch several sats at one time, is really useful.

The funny thing about SpaceX is that their rockets seem to be ever increasing in size. SpaceX still technically has their Falcon 1 in their product catalog and will sell one to you if you absolutely insist, but almost every time they seem to be dealing with customers and responding to the market demand, the size of their rockets seem to continue to get larger.

SpaceX started with the Falcon 5, which grew into the Falcon 9 by adding four more engines and a much larger payload faring. Now SpaceX just announc

Well, actually the Falcon 5 (way back when) has always been meant as a stepping stone to the Falcon 9 and eventually Falcon 9 Heavy. (That was before they developed the Merlin 1D and started referring to it as Falcon Heavy, increasing its mass and payload by about 50%.)

However, Falcon 5 was abandoned, most likely for lack of customers. It was a rather bold move to concentrate on building the Falcon 9 and the Dragon right away, but obviously justified in retrospect. (I thought they'd need it to practice, esp

The means that SpaceX will use to lower their price is to have enough launches that their fixed overhead becomes a minor issue. Right now, launches have a high fixed costs due to too few launches. SpaceX's plan is that FH launches once every 2 months and that F9 launches monthly or even twice a month. That allows them to drop not just the launch pad, but also their launch crew (who are typically on a salary, not hourly), as well as manufacturing costs.

To take this a step further, SpaceX intends to have 8 launches next year, and 12-14 in 2014. That allows them to have their QA under control as well. With this high of a rate, SpaceX will likely not need a back-up for the FH WRT launching sats. OTOH, if we are to go to the moon, we really need two or more systems of similar sizes. Or simply constrain the loads to the smaller of the LVs.

"On top of the four Falcon Heavy launches planned for the U.S. Air Force this year (...)"
Uhm, what? Falcon Heavy's first flight is scheduled for 2013 and it will be a test flight, I doubt it will carry any commercial cargo. Maybe the planning for the US Air Forces launches was done this year, that can be true, but I'm certain that no Falcon Heavy will lift-off in 2012.

I'd have to agree with you on this issue. The official SpaceX manifest [spacex.com] doesn't suggest anything about USAF launches at all (that may be legitimate in terms of trying to keep official secrets, but it isn't listed there). There are technically scheduled four more Falcon 9 launches for this year, with OrbComm claiming to be the next customer stepping up to the bat even before NASA gets another run to the ISS with another Dragon spaceship.

It wouldn't surprise me to see a Falcon 9 launch from Vandenberg though

Am I mistaken or will the Falcon Heavy have 27(!) engines going at liftoff? (3 x the nine engines of a Falcon 9).

I guess they really have the control systems for such a large number of engines licked (in a previous thread I noted that back in the 60s the Russian Moon super-rocket N-1 had 30 engines. It failed, repeatedly.)

So are large numbers of small rockets preferable, efficiency wise, to a few large ones (think the five F-1s of the Saturn V first stage). Or they cheaper in aggregate? Or are they more reliable? (less superhigh pressures in the turbines, I dunno). Or if they fail is there the simple fact of more redundancy (I read that if any one of the Falcon 9s engines conked out it could still make it to orbit. Except right at lift off).

Or did Space-X just not have the funds to develop a really big engine (In which case couldn't they have licensed the design for the F-1 or J-1 from NASA?). Not knocking them, it's still an INCREDIBLE achievement, just wondering.

To quote an Airforce General: "A new plane doesn't make possible a new engine, a new engine makes possible a new plane.". So it's great to see an (obviously) flight worthy new rocket engine!

My guess is that they are using their existing engines, just more of them. That's more cost-effective, since you don't have to develop a whole new engine as you scale up.

Of course, this means more moving parts, therefore, more to go wrong at launch time -- but again, if one engine fails out of 27, no big deal.

If I recall -- Apollo 13 had an engine fail in the second stage and they considered aborting, but managed to slip into orbit. A failure in one of the first stage F-1's would have been disasterous becau

Ideally one big motor is the way to go. But their are reasons for using more than one. The Falcon 9 has an engine out capability so having on of the motors fail is not game over. Also they did it for production reasons. They use the same motor with some minnor modifications for both the first and second stage which saves money. You have one production line for both motors and one stock of most of the parts for the motors.The Falcon 9 is interesting because it is not the most "efficient' design but the most

It's cheaper to have smaller engines, when done right. First, they only need one type of engine. Most rockets use a different kind of engine for each stage. Those engines are build painstakingly by hand. ESA needs a Vulcain 2 engine every two months. Even steps that could be automated are simply not worth the investment at that rate.

If you build 10 or 28 engines per rocket, launching on the order of 10 rockets or more per year, you'll need another engine every day or every other day of the week. That's when

So are large numbers of small rockets preferable, efficiency wise, to a few large ones (think the five F-1s of the Saturn V first stage). Or they cheaper in aggregate? Or are they more reliable?

In general, smaller numbers of larger engines are the preferred choice. It's more reliable, and cheaper to design and manufacture. (All that extra plumbing and thrust structure runs up the cost and weight.)

Or did Space-X just not have the funds to develop a really big engine (In which case couldn't they hav

The various press releases are forgetting something. The Falcon Heavy is third in lift capability behind the Saturn V and the Energia [wikipedia.org] . Granted, the Energia only had two flights before the collapse of the Soviet Union made it too expensive to operate, and on one of the the payload malfunctioned after separation and deorbited itself almost immediately, but in both cases, the booster functioned just fine. It was capable of lifting 100 metric tons to LEO (which was more than enough to give the Buran [wikipedia.org], the S

I just looked again at SpaceX's announcement and saw that they claim the Heavy will put 53 tons in LEO or "more than 12 tons" into GTO.

Well unless the "more than 12 tons" is a lot more than 12 tons, it means you're only getting 1/4 the payload into GTO that the same launch vehicle can put into LEO. That's terrible! (to me). Wasn't it Heinlein who said get to earth orbit and you're halfway to anywhere? Seems like you're only a quarter of the way. Also, GTO (Geo-sync Transfer Orbit?) isn't even all the wa

Really? What about the center core propellent cross-feed? That sounds like a major piece that cannot have been launch tested yet. AFAIK there is no other rocket that has ever had it either so there must be some element of risk. All that mass transfer could go wrong in any number of ways I suppose.

Launching a two stage rocket to orbit is not exciting. Being able to build a tin can with a propulsion module is not exciting. I congratulate SpaceX for having done it, but it's not a major step forward in space technology.

It's pretty damn exciting if you are the company doing it. Just because most people take these things for granted doesn't mean we should dismiss the level of SpaceX's accomplishment. Hell, launching a new car company is pretty drab to most, but it is still a technological feat and is beyond the ability of most people who have ever lived (or ever will).

It's of course true, because little about SpaceX's designs are explicitly 'high tech'.They do not use metallic thermal protection, linear aerospikes, conformal tanks,...

However - it's false because it assumes those things are useful at a given stage in technology.

As an example, trying to bring in turbocharged engines into mass production at Ford in 1910 would have been a great leap forward in terms of technology - but likely an utter failure due to cost and lack of reliability.Things that are not exciting in terms of technology can if well-implemented enormously boost whole areas of the economy.The interstate network was an example of this, as was the invention of containerised transport.

The use of cross-feed is new.No launcher yet has used this concept of feeding from the edge boosters to the middle, so the middle boosters tanks remain full until the outside ones seperate.

This has significant advantages over having either the middle stage light on the pad, and deplete its fuel, or light in mid-air once seperation is over - losing the thrust and increasing gravity losses.

It also has significant (in principle) cost and compatibility advantages.If you can use most of the same parts for a Falcon 9, or a falcon heavy launch that both reduces your production cost, lowers inventory, and allows you perhaps to much more easily develop global reusability.

They were. And it appears that SpaceX has a large number of launches. Many more than what they claim, and a great deal more than what the critics claim. 4 FH launches for spaceX is going to be pretty exciting.

In order to build the Falcon XX, SpaceX will need to finish development of the Merlin 2 engine. The goal is to replace the current 9-engine cluster of the Falcon 9 with a single engine, then build a cluster of those babies for the the Falcon XX.

Then again, I would need to worry about what the USAF needs for sending the mass equivalent of a fully loaded 747 (passengers and cargo included) into low-Earth orbit. If they need to replace the ISS with a USAF station (re-energizing the MOL program) sent up in a

You probably do need that much lift to get the parts up for a real rotating space station.

But, all things being equal, if you have a dozen geosync satellites to put up, loading them all onto one craft, with some extra propellant for final placement is going to be cheaper than doing a dozen separate launches.

The AIr Force always wants more lift. Space vehicles are always weight constrained. More lift = More War Toys for the Boys.

Remember that much of the screwball engineering that the Shuttle played around with was so that the Air Force could have a space bomber. The AF's constantly morphing (and increasing) requirements were one of the primary reasons the system was such a complicated mess. The other reason, of course, being Congress's insistence that it be produced in pretty much every ZIP code in the cou

It's part of his job title, I think a public statement about what Musk thinks is important. And the "Chief" label indicates that it's probably mostly a management position.

But I never understood the emphasis on credentials. Having a particular degree doesn't make you a good rocket builder. Launching rockets that work is a much more credible indicator of your capabilities. Musk and his amazing team have achieved that bit.

But I never understood the emphasis on credentials. Having a particular degree doesn't make you a good rocket builder. Launching rockets that work is a much more credible indicator of your capabilities. Musk and his amazing team have achieved that bit.

Often, the importance of credentials is that you've had formal training. Formal training doesn't tend to give you great new ideas. It doesn't give you vision. It won't make you a genius. It may not even increase your capabilities. But it does wonders, (assuming you studied) to make sure you don't fuck up some mundane detail that has been well understood by the community for some time.

As an example, any idiot can build a lamp that works. But having some formal training can teach you why you hook up th

Going out and hiring the best aerospace engineers on the planet and having them teach you how to build spacecraft by working with them to actually build some stuff is an excellent kind of classroom. I'm sure Elon Musk has learned quite a bit over this past decade since he came up with that crazy idea to send a terrarium to Mars and couldn't find anybody to help him out.

I hate to imagine what would have happened had somebody at Boeing simply said to Elon, "we can put that terrarium on Mars for $1 billion...

SpaceX has loads of NASA people and technology, and couldn't exist except as a NASA contractor backed by NASA.

SpaceX has a great many former NASA employees and has studied some of the data that NASA contractors have produced at taxpayer expense (which data is available to anybody who wants it, including China, Russia, India, and anybody else in the world). I suppose you could argue that SpaceX is using Velcro, Tang, and Space Pens.... please don't get me started on "NASA technology" as I can go off on what kind of joke that really is.

It should also be noted that the Falcon 9 and the Dragon capsule that SpaceX has developed was started independently without a government contract and SpaceX is not dependent upon government funds to get either of those products produced by SpaceX completed. That NASA was handing out money under various programs and SpaceX decided to bring a bucket to catch that money only shows SpaceX has some people who are intelligent and perhaps are a bunch of money grubbers. They may even take that as a compliment, and is a good thing if you want to remain a for-profit company.

SpaceX can survive without NASA, but could NASA survive without SpaceX?

Why does this story have the NASA logo?Maybe the Govt will sell NASA to Spacex

I think this is a very valid question and deserves to be asked.

I would have to say the proper answer is the presumption that NASA is "America's space program", therefore anything having to do with spaceflight obviously must have something to do with NASA.

The real truth here is that neither Intelsat, nor SpaceX in this particular contract have anything at all to do with NASA, any more than FedEx signing a contract with Wal-Mart for parcel shipments between stores would involve NASA either... or NASA would ha

Because when I posted it, i was undergoing severe caffiene withdrawl and tagged it NASA. I realised it about 3 seconds after I hit the 'submit' button. Moral of the story? Don't ascribe malice/conspiracy/whatever to something that can be explained by too much blood in my caffiene system.